The state chronicle. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1883-1893, 1887-06-23

ana work toward dlSclpllnary drills. Ed
ucation was intensely subjective. But
all there is to be learned about this part of
educational work we may learn from the
Greeks
We shall find, long before our day, how
ever, even in the days of the genial Rabe-
las, that the fight between realism and
idealism, between the objective and the
subjective in educations, has begun, out
of which Is to come the steady encroach
ment of the sciences upon the purely
formal studies of the schools
1t is said commonly enough in cduca-
tlonal journals, in the newspapers, and
very often from the hustings, that lit is
the business Of popular education to train
youth for citizenship" Very good. But
it was not a matter of talk with the early
Romans-it was a matter of fact This is
exactly what Roman schooling did do for
five hundred odd years, (and here we see
the New education to be DID, as to prac
tices). There were the gymnastic cxer
cises on the Campus Martius, the recita-
ton of the Salian hymns, the religious
text of the day, the study of the Twelve
Tables, the civil code-these made up the
course of study and drill of the early Ro-
man youth The result was "men the
ulOSu IODuSl, luC luOSU courageous, tuc
best disciplined, the most patriotic that
ever lived" Why2 Well, because the
| mother was the guardian of the family
and the teacher in office, and her business
it was to inspire youth with noble pur-
poses and with the daring to execute them
PestaloZzi's idea); because the family dis
cipline was severe, the authority of the
father being absolute; because the Roman
youth grew up in an atmosphere of divln-
tiles; because the law of his country CON
stituted his earliest and latest reading
book, and he was taught to consider its
teaching sacred and inviolable. 1t was a
time when civic virtues had freest play,
and when men of heroic mold most
| abounded.
But with the conquest at Greece, Ro-
| man education lost its Spartan character
and became Athenian in its drift, save
| that it lacked the spirit of speculative in
| quiry, in which the Greek so delighted
| Not until Quintilian's day, three quarters
| of century into the christian era, did we
have in Roman literature a noteworthy
| treatise on pedagogy, for such is his IN
stitutes of Oratory. He anticipates Fene-
| Ion, Descartes, Locke, Rousseau and Spen
Ger in emphasizing the fact that the activ
| tiles of the child must be pleasurable in
| order to be profitable. ''Let study be to
| him a play" says Quintilian. He also
| appreciates with them the fact that the
| pleasure of study lies in the right calling
| forth of the child's energies-that is, that
| much lies in method. "If the mind rebel
against instruction, it is not nature that
| is to blame" Very true, in the main.
| ''If the child does not study it is the
| teachers fault" Hence it is evident that
Quintilian agrees with the new educa-
| tionists, or rather they agree with him as
opposed to Solomon, in condemning the
use of the rod.
Quintilian's way of having the child use
| language was to have him use it, not alone
to study how to use it. He did not say,
''Iu is in smithing that one learns to be a
smith, but he anticipated Comenius in
advocating the principle if not in putting
| it into apt phrase. For instance the child
| work in grammar consisted most largely
| in exercises in composition, development
| lessons called Chriae, and narratives, to-
| gether with exercises eXplicating the
poets-all this with study of the rules
of composition. 1t is language work dis
tinctly as opposed TO formal grammar-or
better still, it is the former combined with
only the requisite part of the latter, the
aim being to have the pupil use language
| Ccl1cClly, iiuCutly, cioIuoEliS. NSuiiilliIetL
did not know anything about ''diagram
ing but he knew all about a better thing
namely, the study of literature, and how,
in an explication of the text by the pupil
to have him appreciate the beauties of the
| poets and the orators.
Quintilian believes with Col. Parker, OF
rather Col. Parker believes with Quintil
ian, that the burden of elocutionary drill
(aside from drills in voice culture, articu
lation and the like lies in having the pupi
understand feelingly the meaning of the
| author to be rendered THAT the child
| may read we'll, let him have a good under
standing of what he reads" says Quintil
ian. That is really about the soul of thC
matter, but we evidently have not just
| now found it out.
| Plutarch's Morals has much in it of in
improves upon Greek pedagogy by discard
ing ''ethics in contemplation" for ''ethics
in action Much in that. Also, his con
| ception of education is as fine as Carlylc's
Compare these two thoughts: Education
is Thought kindling itself at the fire Of
living thought" co. ''The soul is not {
vase to be filed, but is rather a heartf
which is to be made to glow P.) 1t were
not we'll for modern educators in theil
study of methods to have these quotations
out of mind, or at least to be wanting IL
the spirit of them.
EUGENE c.. BRANsoN.